Field
The instant disclosure relates to fabric computing systems, and in particular to standalone fabric computing platforms.
Description of the Related Art
Computer system virtualization allows multiple operating systems and processes to share the hardware resources of a host computer. Ideally, system virtualization provides resource isolation so that each operating system does not realize that it is sharing resources with another operating system and does not adversely affect the execution of the other operating system(s). Such system virtualization enables applications including server consolidation, co-located hosting facilities, distributed web services, applications mobility, secure computing platforms, and other applications that provide for efficient use of underlying hardware resources.
Many conventional virtualization systems are architected as a monolithic virtualization software system that hosts each virtualized system. That is, such virtualization systems are constructed to host each of the virtualized systems on a particular computing platform. As such, the virtualization systems or virtual machine monitors (VMMs) associate hardware resources of a particular platform with each partition. Typically, this involves sharing of resources across multiple partitions. For example, two partitions may share a same processor and memory resource, although the partitions may be separated by address ranges or otherwise maintained to ensure isolated memory management. Furthermore, two such partitions may also share input/output devices, such as keyboards, mice, printing ports, Ethernet ports, or other communications interfaces.
However, in many of these conventional virtualization systems, e.g., where partitions are able to intercommunicate, such partitions may not have adequate security with respect to other partitions or systems that are within the same fabric, but which should not necessarily be authorized to intercommunicate.
To address this issue and other issues, securely partitioned (s-Par®) virtualization systems have been developed. In addition to enhanced partition security, such securely partitioned virtualization systems have dedicated physical resources for each partition. Securely partitioned virtualization systems also have been developed that can be executed using a Forward Fabric architecture. A Forward Fabric architecture allows applications and/or services to run across multiple operating systems instantiations that may exist within single or multiple platforms.
Conventional securely partitioned virtualization systems use various network cards (NICs) and host bus adapters (HBAs) on the physical host computing system to assign each partition in the securely partitioned virtualization system an interface, e.g., an interface to a data center or a local area network (LAN). Therefore, a sufficient number of network cards and host bus adapters are needed to meet the needs of the multiple partitions. Accordingly, a sufficient number of cables likewise are needed.